Album Notes

Els Segons Temps / The Second Times - By Darian Stavans.

Jaime Narvaez - Guitar.


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"In knowledge we tread forward."

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PRODUCT DESCRIPTION

Els Segons Temps (The Second Times) is a very personal work for its composer. The music looks back to his origin and disarms conflicts as it resolves his emotional corners leading him to transform interior refinement into a delicious score.

One would assume that the title of the album bespeaks second opportunities, but in fact that’s not the case. Likewise, the title in Catalan references nothing more that a very good friend of the artist’s. What really matters about this album, however, is its virtue of translating into sound the forcefulness of its author’s intimate life bereft of its complex acts and facts that serve only as a source of inspiration for musical delight.

Guitarist Jaime Narváez renders an extraordinary interpretation of this work conveying its very foundation and origin. Listening to and understanding the force of this beautiful manuscript makes this an album one returns to time and again.


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ABOUT THE ARTIST


Evocative is a word that has been used to describe, or better said, react to the music of Darian Stavans. Evocative? One would imagine that such a music would bring to the mind and heart shared memories, but one does not necessarily share memories with an artist; one shares feelings, reflections, dreams. These are the things one finds in the music of Darian Stavans— a passage of sorts to that special place we all have deep in our souls.

The apparent simplicity of works such as Interiors, Passion, and Poetic is powerfully touching and intensely beautiful. Captivating melodies hold our attention as their notes drop ever deeper into the soul of the listener, retrieving echoes of the human experience we all share. Our lives may be different, but our feelings are not. Stavans’ music glides us soothingly into currents of profoundly romantic reverie, pools of sunlit serenity, and occasionally into the depths of fleeting melancholy.

Stavans, the composer, imbues his music with texture: a guitar lends its sometimes earthy, sometimes airy quality to Els Segons Temps; whereas a lighter, more translucent harp is used to render Lullabies. In making his music come alive, Stavans has also become a producer (he produced all the works featured here) and a conductor. He conducted and recorded the St. Angelis Symphony Orchestra for his works Noir et Blanc and Prayer.

Nonetheless, Darian Stavans is first and foremost a gifted composer and pianist. His music speaks his soul and in so doing, speaks to our own. Perhaps listening to his works we might become acquainted with the artist, but it would be more accurate to say, we become reacquainted with ourselves.

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A native of Ajalvir, a small town close to Madrid Spain, Jaime Narvaez received his musical training in Bilbao from Eduardo Zozaya and Manolo Férez.
Living today in Toledo Spain, he has held a professorship at Toledo School of Music since 1988, and since 1989 has served as Guitar Player at the same school. International recognition was established in 1990 when he won the Tercer Premio de la Guitarra Española, and has grown through his recording career with over five recordings. Jaime Narvaez performs frequently in major international halls and concert festivals. He conducts master classes in interpretation of XX century guitar music.

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